The present invention relates to a multilingual conversation system that can enjoy a conversation between a plurality of languages and, more particularly, to a multilingual conversation system that can be effectively used during overseas travels or the like.
In general, it is hard for people other than native speakers to master a foreign language perfectly. This becomes a bar to cultural or perceptional exchanges particularly between Japanese people and the other people in different countries at present. On the other hand, it is anticipated that the wave of globalization would enlarge opportunities of having a conversation with foreigners, and also would increase the necessity of mutual understanding between people in various countries.
Conventionally, as portable devices that make multilingual conversations possible, some devices have been proposed such that a usage sentence of, for example, Japanese which is appropriate for a conversational scene is selected to be translated, for example, into English, to be then displayed on a screen in the form of an English sentence, and to be converted into voice of the displayed English sentence. In these portable devices, it is also possible to display simple greetings or the like in a foreign language corresponding to Japanese and to generate their voices.
As set forth in the above, the intention of the conventionally used portable devices is directed to making a foreigner, who is a partner of the conversation, understand a speaker's talk by translating a native language into a foreigner's language and by announcing a translated sentence and the like on a display screen or a voice. In other words, consideration is made in these conventional devices of this type only about grammatically faithfully translating words, sentences or the like of the speaker's native language.
Additionally, portable devices of this type have only a small number of conversational scenes together with a small number of sentences and words prepared for each scene. Furthermore, only a single sentence or a single word is selectable on the screen and these words are selected by scrolling the screen. Therefore, they are useless in a practical conversation requiring quick responses.
On the other hand, conversations do not always require accurate translations or there are many scenes in conversations where only a few words will be enough to understand a speaker's intention. For example, a meal scene at a restaurant or the like needs to order a desired dish by only telling a name of the desired dish to a waiter or waitress. In addition, a conversation in a shopping scene can be made by using a limited number of words. This is true of conversations between people from different countries speaking different languages. At any rate, there are many cases where sufficient mutual understanding can be accomplished among foreign people with different languages only by pronouncing words with the help of physical gesture, namely, a body language.